Something About Ajax and the Inevitable
by Kay the Cricketed
Summary: [Drabble, post!Volume Four]  Leo stays long after his brothers begin to start the process of leaving.  For some reason, he never thought time would be his enemy or only companion.


_Something About Ajax and the Inevitable_

by Kay

Disclaimer: I don't own Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I just own a lot... and I mean a lot... of their stuff.

Author's Notes: Drabble, Leo's POV in second person. Based off of the Volume Four comic books and where they were headed, so post!series. WARNING: SPOILERS - what you mostly need to know from Volume Four - is that Splinter is dead, Don is running around with the Utroms after they reveal themselves to Earth (allowing all aliens, and turtles pretending to be them, to walk freely on the surface), Mikey has a job with the alien transports (and is recovering from suffering in an alien prison), and Raph is... Raph. Yeah.

That being said, most of that isn't _necessary_ knowledge, but it's nice background. This can be read without it. Thanks for anyone who gives it a try! I really appreciate it.

* * *

Master Splinter tells you that time eventually becomes an old friend, almost companionable in its silent presence as life begins to taper down. Sophocles tells you that it brings all things from darkness into light, then covers them once more (_the noble Ajax impaled on his sword to escape its grasp_). A Japanese proverb tells you to fall seven times and stand up eight. Michael Cibenko tells you that those who gaze too frequently into the past turn around to find the future has run out on them, and this is what you feel like most of all as the numbered days of the calendar are crumpled and piled in the trash can. You get so sick of counting.

Mikey tells you, in the infamous words of the Rolling Stones, "Time is on my side, yes it is."

You think that maybe time is on his side, after all, because there's so much for everyone to do now that the Utroms are here. Normally before, Donny would run off to explore a new project, Raph seeking nights on the streets with Casey until winter chased them away. Even Mikey had his fun. But they always used to come home to you, more or less in one piece, when there was nowhere else to go. Mikey complaining about the new issue of _Ultimate Spiderman_. Raph grumbling about autumn and ignoring the mug of hot tea you would place quietly by his elbow. Don grinning wide, grime smeared across his neck—you heard what he'd say by watching the wide gestures of the wrench clenched in his fingers.

They were once yours.

But the world is open to them now, and it's only a matter of time. Time. You like how slow it once moved, but the sluggish drift has shuddered to a crawl. The hours spent in the lair alone stretch like old bones, phantom voices waking you up on the sofa until you almost don't believe it when they _are_ home. Don is running in a million and one directions, too far to keep an eye on—he stops to explain, shoving things in his duffle bags, patting your shoulder on the way out the door. You miss talking to him and having something to say in return. Mikey has the job he refuses to quit, even though last time it landed him in a mess that took months to sort out. (_All those nightmares you soothed, how he seemed deflated when he returned and you couldn't bear it, that skinny malnourishment, that gaping smile_.) Raph takes his time, but eventually he, too, can't be expected back in the same day. You like the way his shoulders are relaxed, his speech easy. You cling to his affectionately gruff conversations more than he knows, but it's already disappearing as the call pulls him away.

You quickly discover there is nothing here without them.

The books are ash in your hands, your mind sensing the steady burn and decay and futility. Television is stale without meaning. Training, the brightest point of the morning, merely a distraction rather than a need. Sometimes you drop by to see Karai and try to fish out what secrets she's keeping, but she seems to recognize your growing indifference because there is something akin to pity in her eyes. You hate seeing it, so you begin to drift away from that, as well.

(_You find yourself staring at your father's mug between the loose grasp of your hands in the kitchen for hours, hours, hours. The tea is cold.)_

They still come back. Days afterwards. Once, a week. Then longer sometimes, though never without letters, phone calls, laughter. Never all at once. But it's only… soon, your mind listlessly reminds itself, you should be prepared. Now that everyone can see them, it's harder to keep track. One arm can only be yanked so far to the west and the other to the east. At the most, all you can do is trust them and go where you can, follow where footsteps allow; a watchfulness that becomes the focal point of living. You have become the observer instead of the guide. Perhaps Master Splinter would find this as amusing as you do (_but rather, he'd be angry_).

They have so much ahead of them. Mikey's a gift to the public in a way he's always wanted to be—his cell phone is full of numbers you don't recognize. Don, if he were a commodity, would be ripped in every direction (_but he'd been yours first, from childhood, that shy smile when you asked what he was doing_). Raph spends a lot of time visiting Shadow and hanging out in the bars, but he's recovering his balance. Been talking to people like him. Getting interested in helping out with the effort against anti-alien terrorists. You're proud of him (_you're waiting for him to ask you to join_) and maybe, in the end, it's all for the best.

You just wish it isn't all about… waiting.

Let it be over with. Let the ax fall. You hate that calendar. For all you pretend to be calm, to be accepting, to be supportive, there is the truth you discover in every meditation, the core sickness that spreads inside and rests heavy in your chest. All the chidings and scolding and hot tea and sandwiches—the smile when you listen to Don say he'll be back soon, don't worry, he'll call (_be careful, be so careful out there, Donny_)—the clock you want to freeze, Mikey's abandoned video games you cannot win, the sickly sweet incense for your father and the way Raph sometimes cocks his head like he's hearing Master Splinter, too, or maybe he's just hearing you screaming inside your head (_screaming_) and—

Time is not your friend, it's not necessary, it's not _on your side, Mikey_. It's drowning and blanking out, forgetting when you've slept and what you've dreamt, waiting for calls when they have already come not ten minutes ago. Never enough. You will never be (_have_) enough. For the first time in a long time, you don't have a plan. You have nothing. (_How long will they let you take to say goodbye this time?_) And you know if you could just… _say_ something. Anything. Stand up and walk with them. Hold out your hand. Let your eyes do the speaking (_give me something, a part of you, that which won't dissolve in water_). Then they'd know and they'd take you and it'd be okay.

But you don't.

And you won't.

And sometimes, you think time is cruel for never telling you there had to be an ending to this.

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_The End_

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End file.
